


Star-Crossed Neighbours

by twitch



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Cats, Dogs, Gen, M/M, Pets, Pre-Slash, cats and dogs befriending each other, what is this world coming to??
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-03
Updated: 2017-05-03
Packaged: 2018-10-27 20:13:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,417
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10815912
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/twitch/pseuds/twitch
Summary: When Poe tells him that he needs company Kylo thinks nothing of it. But thinking on the subject later, while a dogwalker walks her charges under his window, he comes up with a different idea.





	Star-Crossed Neighbours

**Author's Note:**

> A prompt fill from kyluxsoftkinks over at tumblr: "Kylo adopts a puppy who becomes friends with Millicent." 
> 
> A fluffy idea (and not just for the four-legged cuties within) but with the edge of danger that cats sometimes tread...

Kylo didn’t know much about the neighbours who lived on the floor above him. He knew the guy directly up from his apartment was grouchy enough when he had played his television too loud one night. He hadn’t intentionally done it, just forgetting how loud he set it to the last time he had it on. Poe had sat down on the couch, spending the night after a late night out drinking, but not seeing the remote control the television blasted with the sounds of a movie depicting a WWII battle.

Ever since then the old crock glared at him whenever he had the chance. Normally when they bumped into each other, coming or going through the common front door or picking up mail. 

The man living beside Grouchy was a different matter. He hadn’t seen any glimpse of him in all the time since Kylo moved in. At one point he thought the apartment was vacant but the fact that items were moved around the balcony door on a frequent basis suggested that someone did live there.

Another night, Poe seated on the couch beside him, trying to toss popcorn into his mouth, he stopped once a kernel bounced off his forehead. “You need company.”

“I have you,” Kylo pointed out, his friend more entertaining than the movie they watched on Netflix.

“And we get together… once every two or three weeks? Do you meet up with anyone else but me?” Ignoring the popcorn for the time being, Poe wiped butter off from his face, forehead and chin.

“My schedule is hardly the best to regularly set up social calls.” He had steady work but the gallery was open seven days a week, from morning to late evening. His shifts came up at any time, never set in stone. Plus painting happened in the hours left free. 

“Rey has mentioned that she phones you, trying to get you to come out with her and Finn.”

Kylo’s prompt sip was answer on its own.

Good intentions as they were Kylo had almost forgotten about Poe’s conversation. Poe was all the friends he needed and when he was mentally prepared for it Rey could be good company too, but deep down he was quite content spending his free time at home.

It wasn’t until a few days latter, a light rainfall spattering the sidewalks, that he spotted a dogwalker expertly wielding four leashes, leading the four dogs who waggled and sniffed their way in front of her. 

He phoned Poe to come to his place three days later.

He wasn’t sure who was more excited, the fluffball who accosted Poe’s legs or Poe.

“What’s his name?” Poe asked once he and the dog were on the couch.

“Obi.”

Poe burst out laughing. “I’m not sure he would like that.”

The dog balanced in his lap cocked his head, red-brown hair and ears flopping with the movement. Suddenly his tongue was back in his mouth and the puppy was calm, golden eyes watching intently.

Puppy as Obi was he was easy to train. Outside he obeyed Kylo’s commands, never snapping at other dogs on their walks, stopping at all intersections before they crossed. Around strangers and friends he was a bundle of energy but a firm no would still him from when he nearly crossed the line. From morning into afternoon and evening he was ready whenever Kylo was.

Yet early mornings were a curious thing. Kylo would take Obi outside to do his morning routine of relieving himself. Once inside he’d scratch at the door to the balcony. The balcony wasn’t especially big and with the wrought iron rails Kylo hadn’t let him out onto it without himself present. By now Obi was big enough that him falling through wasn’t a risk. 

Once Obi was outside he’d bark a couple of times. Grouchy complained at first but had learned to ignore it. 

On the mornings that Kylo had to go to work Obi would reluctantly shuffle inside. 

Those were the days Kylo was fairly sure he saw green eyes peering down from the not-empty apartment.

It took a couple of weeks for Kylo to find the green eyes on the opposite side of the door, returning from work to see Obi waiting at the balcony door. At least Kylo had thought it was waiting before realising there was an animal out on his balcony and not just a reflection of Obi.

A short-haired red-furred cat who pawed at the door.

“Obi?” Kylo called, nudging the apartment door shut with his foot.

The sound of his voice and the door startled the cat. By the time Kylo stood in front of the balcony, groceries still in arm, he watched the cat balanced on the balcony railing leap onto the railing next over.

His heart was still beating hard in his throat, barely relieved.

He was still terrified several hours later, after watching the cat manoeuvre his way up to the balcony above, slipping inside to the apartment by way of a too loose door that it managed to paw open. He’d been pacing the hallway that Grouchy and the cat shared. Grouchy was about to report him to their landlord but Kylo nearly backed him into his apartment.

“I don’t want to be responsible for your neighbour’s cat falling to its death!”

Whatever he’d been ready to snap back fell silent, mouthing silently before lips formed a tight line. “He won’t be back until seven and I don’t want to listen to you pacing for another four hours.”

Anxiously keeping an eye on his balcony, Obi whining at the door, Kylo returned to the third floor. He attempted eating dinner but found his appetite lacking. Or perhaps it was nerves that made his stomach uninterested in food. 

Ten minutes after seven Kylo knocked on the door.

To his surprise he was greeted by another set of green eyes. “How may I help you?”

He hadn’t prepared himself for what to say. He bit into his lip, frozen for a few seconds, before finding his voice. “Do you have a red cat?”

The hand that had been steady against the door frame recoiled in surprise, loosely clenching. “Yes I do, how do you know that?”

“Your cat has been visiting my dog on my balcony.” Kylo frowned for the implication, which his neighbour quickly grasped onto considering his features paled. “You need to call the landlord to fix your door. I don’t know how often he’s been getting loose-”

“She,” he corrected, already stepping away from the doorway, striding towards where his cell phone sat on a table. 

“But I imagine it’s been… at least a week? My dog has been looking lovelorn up to your door.”

“Star-crossed lovers,” he muttered under his breath, snatching up a pad of paper and punching numbers into his phone with more force than necessary. “Come in, I want a second source to give this guy shit.”

Stepping inside he closed the door in good time. Within seconds he felt something brushing up against his leg.

Looking down he saw the cat, blinking up at him before meowing her hello. A mirror image of her owner, truly, he couldn’t help but chuckle under his breath.

Five minutes later, phone passed from neighbour to him and back, the phone was turned off and set down again. “Thank you for letting me know. I wouldn’t have known at all that Millicent was sneaking off like that.”

“I just want you to keep her safe,” Kylo explained, glancing back to the door now that he wasn’t required for verification to their landlord. “She’s a lot smaller than my Obi – my dog, and they seem to get along.”

“Thank you…” Hesitating, not for the gratitude, he waited a few seconds before extending his hand out. “My name is Hux.”

“Oh, Kylo Ren.” Taking Hux’s hand in his own, which felt cool in his grasp, perhaps from fright not worked off entirely, he jerked his head vaguely to the left. “I live in the apartment below Grouchy.”

“I’m pretty sure he was responsible for the last guy who lived there moving out.”

Unwilling to move away yet, wondering if that’s how Obi and Millicent behaved before he caught them in the act, he slowly released Hux’s hand. “I have dinner ready downstairs… do you and Millicent want to come down for a safer play date?”

A smile pulled at the corner of Hux’s lips. “I think she’d like that.”


End file.
